Greg Christopher Basketball Hires

First and foremost, let me say that I think Greg has done a lot of really good things on and around campus, and specifically in the Cintas Center. Been a great 6 years in many ways since Greg took over.

However, I thought this was interesting when someone else mentioned it to me in passing, so I wanted to share it. In Greg's 13 years as an A.D., he has four basketball coaches (between Bowling Green and Xavier).

B.G. WBB: Jennifer Roos, who had been the in-house Associate Head Coach, and she compiled a record of 92-97 (which includes going 24-11 and 30-5 in her first two years...but since then going 9-21, 10-18, 8-23, 11-19) before being let go.

B.G. MBB: Louis Orr compiled a career record at B.G. of 101-121 before being relieved of his duties.

Xavier WBB: Brian Neal has gone 76-100 in his career, never finishing better than 8-10 in the Big East. They have made one appearance in the post-season with Brian, in the WBI, in 2014-15. Obviously Brian's early tenure was on the heels of the Amy Waugh fiasco (who was hired by Bobinski), but he has had a lot of time since to get things turned around.

Xavier MBB: Travis Steele, while obviously INCREDIBLY early, is 11-12 as we all know.

This all may mean absolutely nothing, or, well, it doesn't. Time will tell I guess, but that trend is more than a little concerning.

I brought it up in another thread but with Greg moving into a big role at Xavier while remaining A.D. it will be interesting to see how that plays out if god forbid Steele doesn’t become what I still think he can

Given the track record of hiring assistants who understand the program, what would be the argument against Travis?

I'm not sure if this directly answers your question, but my response would be the same today as it was in March -- just because promoting Sean and Chris worked perfectly, that has 0% to do with whether or not Travis will be a good hire. Sean and Chris are really, really good, so whichever mechanism was used to hire them (whether it was Xavier promoting from within or one of them getting plucked from the bench to be a head coach elsewhere), it was going to look great.

Travis should have been, and hopefully was, hired only if Greg and the Administration were sure he was exactly the right guy -- he should not have been hired because promoting his chair to head coach worked beautifully with Sean and Chris. That isn't a predictor of future success necessarily.

I'm not sure if this directly answers your question, but my response would be the same today as it was in March -- just because promoting Sean and Chris worked perfectly, that has 0% to do with whether or not Travis will be a good hire. Sean and Chris are really, really good, so whichever mechanism was used to hire them (whether it was Xavier promoting from within or one of them getting plucked from the bench to be a head coach elsewhere), it was going to look great.

Travis should have been, and hopefully was, hired only if Greg and the Administration were sure he was exactly the right guy -- he should not have been hired because promoting his chair to head coach worked beautifully with Sean and Chris. That isn't a predictor of future success necessarily.

I don't disagree with this, except to point out that Miller was hired without interviewing any other candidates. Miller was given the job a few hours after Matta left. Mack and Travis were hired after interviewing a number of other candidates. My impression is that more candidates were interviewed in the Travis hiring than in the Mack hiring.

That said, I am sure the fact that hiring within in the program in the past has worked, that had something to do with Travis getting the job.

For once and for all, can we end the myth that Xavier has been successful by always hiring from within? Take a look back at the modern era of Xavier basketball....

Staak - previously an assistant at Penn
Gillen - previously an assistant at Notre Dame
Prosser - not sure how to call this one. He had been an assistant at Xavier for 7 years and then took over the Loyola program. So, technically, he did not come off the bench as an assistant at Xavier, although he had spent the bulk of his coaching time there.
Matta - previously head coach at Butler
Miller - previously assistant at Xavier
Mack - previously assistant at Xavier

So it can be seen that only the last two coaches prior to Steele came directly from the Xavier bench. The four previous coaches came from other universities (again, depending on how you want to classify Prosser.) The myth that Xavier always hires from the bench is just that - a myth.

Given Christopher's track record of hires, did he simply fall for the myth and hire from within? Did he simply hire a guy with a good powerpoint presentation and a good tagline (the final two percent)? I, for one, would have felt much better about the future had this been a Bobinski hire.

Time will tell if he made the right hire, but the report that concerned me most during the coaching search was the one that had players threatening the transfer if Steele didn't get the job and that threat factoring in to Christopher's thinking.

I was just asking if you are Greg Christopher is this what you would have done?

I'm not saying it's right or wrong, I trust that the person in charge of hiring, in this case Greg Christopher, did his due diligence in making this hire. IMO I believe it was the right one, I also believe he wasn't left with a whole lot to work with. He may also be different in how he handles situations and players who played under Mack may have expected it to be the same and when it wasn't they acted out. I don't know and can't say for sure but listening to interviews and his radio show it appears he has a plan and is trying to execute it. He may have expected more out of the personnel then they are capable, no clue. At this point, I think some of the guys who are not playing need to go see what they can do.